Okay I posted here about 5 months ago and about a month after my initial post, I ended up having a double decompressive lumbar laminectomy and discectomy on L4-L5 and L5-S1. The neurosurgeon who did my surgery did mention that once he did the incision and actually saw my spine that the damage was worse than he thought and he had to take more out than he had planned to. Anyway, I was in the hospital 3 days post-op and went home with instructions to move around as much as I could tolerate. I seemed to be doing good but I gradually lost mobility. I've been going to see my NS once a month since the surgery and he has kept up with "walk atleast 10-15 minutes a day" which I physically cannot do. I mean I walk and move around as much as I can but after a few minutes, my legs feel like they're on fire and more often than not, I lose feeling down the sides and backs of my legs.
So finally last month he prescribed PT (after questioning ME why I wasn't going to PT already. I had to tell him that when I asked for PT he said he didn't "believe" in PT). Anyway, the therapists were really agressive and didn't work up to the big exercises. By that I mean I was doing some pretty big exercises right off the bat. I had more back and muscle spasms and numbness episodes during physical therapy than I've had since the surgery. I told the therapists, both of them, that my legs just felt sore and weak but they just seemed to brush that aside and insisted that it was nothing to be concerned about. Things came to a head when I physically could not move after I got home from therapy one day.
Now, let me pause here to say that I have very limited feeling in my legs and both legs drag when I walk because I cannot pick them up. I'm walking with a cane all the time. My left leg is worse because I can barely feel anything in that leg and my right leg just hurts all the time.
So I came home from PT one day and sitting down was excrutiating so I laid down on my bed with my ice pack and with a pillow between my legs. I was on my side. My husband came in to check on me and when me tried to move my pillow, I screamed. The slightest movements jarred my back and felt like there was fire spreading out from my back and down my legs. I took my painkillers (Darvocet) and nothing. I waited and took my muscle relaxers (
Carisoprodol) and nothing. I even tried my Ibuprofen. Nothing. I forced myself to get up and walk around but had to have my husband help because walking was unbearable. I even forced myself to go to PT and they used an interferential current and ice and that helped some. They also restricted my movement/exercises. My therapist also mentioned on my first visit that he could see on my MRI that L5-S1 was bulging which shocked me because my NS said my MRI looked good.
I guess what I'm wondering is if there's anyone else around here that's had this happen. I mean the level of pain I'm in is right up there with the pain I was in before the surgery but my NS won't hear that. I go back to him in about a week. I'm just terrified that I've reherniated that L5-S1 disc. And I'm bitter because I've done everything the NS and the therapists have told me and not done what they told me not to do. I've gone on a diet and can tell I've lost weight but I just feel like I'm right back where I was before the surgery.
Has anyone else had a similar situation either with this kind of surgery or the like? What happened and what was the outcome?
4 months post op and pain is back...
Linear Mode
